So here’s the scenario. You have a community tank containing several species, at least two of which you’re certain you have a breeding pair. You’re doing routine tank maintenance and you stumble upon some really small fry. They’re much too small to identify the species. So how do you know what you have?

Great question. There is no simple answer, but you can possibly identify the fry via the process of elimination. Here’s how:

Adding new fish to a tank, whether it’s a new set-up or an existing tank, is always exciting. That is until you realize that you’ve got a bad combination of fish, which manifests itself in aggression. How does that happen?

Not every mix of species, size, and/or gender will result in tank harmony. It’s incumbent upon you, as a fish keeper, to understand the problems created when you mix the wrong fish.

You ever stand, look at one of your tanks, and notice something seems off? I usually get that from my fishes’ behavior. EVERY time I feed my fish, I do a headcount. That might not be easy to do if you have a really large tank with tons of fish. However, my largest, most populated tank is a 75g with ~20 fish, so it’s easy.

Not only do I do a headcount, but I’ve become so used to their behavior, I can usually tell something is going on within seconds. Though fish can get sick and linger for days untreated, they can also expire quite suddenly, especially if they get beaten to death by a tankmate. Typically, however, you should know pretty quickly when something isn’t right.

If you recall my post a couple of weeks ago about new fish, one of the new fish was a Chalinochromis popelini. It was a juvenile, and I wasn’t sure what the gender was. Anyway, I put him/her in a 75g community tank with other juvenile species. When I fed everyone the night before last, I noticed the popelini at the back of the tank, upright and hovering just above the sand. It wasn’t hiding, per se, nor was it being bullied. In fact, I had not witnessed any harassment at all since I introduced him/her to the tank. On the other hand, the behavior was atypical. Usually, it came out and swam around grabbing morsels of food just like everyone else. This time, it didn’t. That concerned me.

Yesterday morning when I checked on the tanks, he/she was dead atop a ceramic tube. There were no physical signs which might point to an unfortunate tankmate encounter. I knew when I saw him/her that evening that something wasn’t right. My intuition was correct.

While cleaning one of the 75g tanks today, I noticed a single fry hugging the sand. I would never have noticed it had it not darted when I got close with the vacuum.

What species is it? Not sure. However, I’m confident it has to be either a Julidichromis ornatus or an Altolamprologus compressiceps Kasanga goldhead because those are the only multiples (multiple specimens of the same species) that are in the tank.

I guess it could theoretically be a black skirt tetra, since I have five of them as dithers. However, my understanding is they aren’t the easiest to breed and the water is not conducive, so I’m doubting that’s it.

The other option is that someone hasn’t followed the rules – meaning hybridization – because all the other cichlid species are singles.

I’m going to go with the Julies. I’m pretty certain the goldheads aren’t mature enough yet to breed. I think the Julies are just barely mature enough and, given that I only saw a single baby, I’m guessing this was one of their first spawns. It’s not uncommon that early spawns don’t produce large broods.

I’ll update this post if 1) the baby (and any others) avoids predation long enough to identify or 2) there is another brood with higher numbers so I can identify them.

I visited my LFS yesterday and picked up some new fish, specifically the following:

2 x Lamprologus ocellatus

1 x Chalinochromis popelini

1 x Neolamprologus cylindricus

I already have 4 x L. ocellatus from a different line. Of those, I’m only certain that there is one male in the group. The other three are still too small to accurately sex. The two I purchased today are even younger, so I have no idea what their sexes are. My plan is to have at least one breeding pair from the two lines. Time will tell.

The popelini and cylindricus are both young as well. I added them to a 75g Tang community tank that already has the following (all still very young, except for the Telmat and tetras):

3 x Altolamprologus compressiceps Kasanga goldhead (unsexed)

5 x Julidochromis ornatus (unsexed)

1 x Lamprologus signatus (male)

1 x Lamprologus ocellatus (male)

1 x Telmatochromis sp. “temporalis shell” (male)

5 x Black skirt tetras (Gymnocorymbus ternetzi) as dithers

I mentioned above that I already had four L. ocellatus, which includes the one listed above in the community tank. The other three are in a 30g square tank, which they occupy alone.

Those hobbyists who have a room dedicated to multiple fish tanks usually call it their fish room. Often these rooms don’t necessarily house show tanks, in the sense that the tanks aren’t set up as home decor. Instead, they house tanks of all sizes, racked rather than on individual tank stands.

I don’t have a fish room like that. All of my tanks, except quarantine and breeding tanks, are in rooms in my house as part of the regular decor. They’re all show tanks. However, I do have what I call a fish workshop. Instead of being dedicated to tanks, this room is dedicated to all of my equipment and supplies. I posted about the workshop shortly after moving into the house my wife and I bought earlier this year. Even my initial arrangement in the new workshop was light years better than what I had previously, which was a fish closet.

Well, I’ve redone the workshop since that post back in March. Why a workshop? If you’re a regular reader of the blog, you might recall my philosophy on supplies. I am a just-in-case person, which is reflected in the photos. Yes, that’s a black 75g stand against the wall in the first photo below. What’s inside the stand? Spare canister filters, seven of them to be exact.

If you recall my post last month about moving my breeding pair of Telmatochromis sp. “temporalis shell” to a brand new tank, that didn’t work out. Before I could get the new tank set up, I noticed some fry hanging around the domed cave when it was in the 75g. Because the pair had clearly spawned again and the female was staying in the cave, I was able to move her and most of the fry all at once to an existing 20g. Though I didn’t want to put them in a tank with substrate, I had to get them out of the 75g community tank to restore some harmony.

If you’re using sand as a substrate, you’re using power filters, and you keep destroying filter impellers because of the sand, you’re doing something wrong. I regularly hear of hobbyists claiming they can no longer use power filters because of impellers getting fouled by sand. Even if your tank is stocked with sand sifter cichlids (e.g., eartheaters like Gymnogeophagus or Santanoperca species), using power filters should not be a problem.

Here’s the scenario. You’re setting up a new cichlid tank or redoing an existing one. You have this great idea for creating lots of unique caves with densely packed rocks. After nearly an hour, you have it just right.

A few days later, you start to do a water change and it hits you. How am I going to clean around and under all these these rocks?

75g tank densely loaded with rocks and decorations. Photo courtesy of the author.